Tag: Siddhartha Gautama

  • Islam and Theosophy: Are Jesus and Buddha “Divine Messengers?”

    Islam and Theosophy: Are Jesus and Buddha “Divine Messengers?”

    Are Jesus and Buddha “Divine Messengers?” (Two-Fold Answer): The concept of the lineage of Prophetic Wisdom and Divine (or Spiritual Messengers) is a concept I came to when studying the history of both Manichaeism and Islam. This is not an odd thing to hear among Muslims. Some simply mention to me, that traditionally, there are…

  • Before the Conversion: Helena Blavatsky on Shakyamuni Buddha and Buddhism

    Before the Conversion: Helena Blavatsky on Shakyamuni Buddha and Buddhism

    The nineteenth-century saw its first public Western converts to Buddhism, or this is how it is usually defined in books. Although Helena P. Blavatsky cannot be described as a “Western convert,” H.P.B. and Henry S. Olcott, an American lawyer who worked on U.S. President Lincoln’s assassination case, were the two leading movers of the Theosophical…

  • Siddhartha Gautama in Kalama Sutta: ‘Do not believe on faith…’

    Siddhartha Gautama in Kalama Sutta: ‘Do not believe on faith…’

    Believe nothing on faith alone, or on authority. “Now, Kalamas, don’t go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, ‘This contemplative is our teacher.’ When you know for yourselves that, ‘These qualities are skillful; these qualities…

  • The Context of Alfred P. Sinnett’s ‘Esoteric Buddhism’

    The Context of Alfred P. Sinnett’s ‘Esoteric Buddhism’

    A.P. Sinnett’s Esoteric Budhism 1884 In learning about ‘Theosophy,’ it is still wise to return to the very first installments, expressing what it is, namely Alfred Percy Sinnett’s Esoteric Buddhism (online 1884 ed.), or rather Budhism. This 1884 work was the result or learning acquired from correspondences between A.P. Sinnett and the two gentlemen, Koot Hoomi…